r/skylanders • • Aug 15 '26

Mod Post HEARTBREAKER BUCKSHOT NFC DUMP MEGATHREAD

218 Upvotes

Hello all!

As some of you may have heard, u/EmberDione and u/The_Somnambulist were kind enough to dump the data from their functional Heartbreaker Buckshot NFC, after u/Dague-Pirate-Dad posted a picture of his personal non-functional HBB figure. (If Ember or Somnambulist, or someone in the Reverse Engineering Discord, make their own announcement post I will link it here.)

Since this is one of the biggest events in the community since the release of Skylanders Imaginators, the mod team has decided we need to create a megathread, to collect some of the most common questions, as well as a short history of how we got here and why this is so important to the community.

If you are strictly here for a guide on how to play Heartbreaker Buckshot, feel free to skip down to the Questions and Answers section of this post.

Since this is our Mod Team's first attempt at a megathread, please bear with us as we learn.

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Enforcement will be as follows:

❌ - Repetitive posts (i.e. simply "re-announcing" the news, how-to's, and re-sharing the dump file yourself) will be removed and linked to this post

❌ - Posts (not comments) asking how to play HBB will be removed and linked, comments will be linked to this post

❌ - Posts attempting to sell HBB or any other NFC cards are against the rules and will be removed

✅ - Unique or otherwise interesting posts, including but not limited to YOUR personal adventures with HBB, custom HBB figures, adding a card / custom toy to your collection, technical information about HBB, etc. will STAY UP... although of course we encourage posting these in the comments of this megathread too

The Donor Figure - Ember and Somnambulist's Functional Heartbreaker

History of Heartbreaker Buckshot

Heartbreaker Buckshot is the variant of Buckshot. Announced and marketed with Skylanders Imaginators on YouTube and the website, Heartbreaker Buckshot was planned to release around Valentines Day 2017. There are a few theories as for why this never happened, the common one being that production was stopped due to fears of it looking "satanic", given the variant being a red-eyed goat (and the five unreleased creation crystals being collateral of this production stoppage), as part of the end of the Skylanders franchise.

Perhaps a more credible theory, postured to me by someone in connection with the devs, is that the factory had gotten shut down and production had stopped for an otherwise unrelated reason. By the time the factory was back online, it was too late.

Ember herself has chimed in and said, that wasn't it either - rather just that it was canceled due to low early-wave sales. Regardless, all that's left were factory samples of HBB and the 5 creation crystals.

Since then, the Skylanders community has been hard at work reverse engineering Skylanders variants back into existence. Think, Gearhead VVind-Up, BullTrain, and all the various Debug minions. But there was one thing stopping the community from reverse engineering Heartbreaker Buckshot and the five unreleased Creation Crystals... Imaginators was the first and only game Activision implemented encryption for the figures. Because of this, it is fundamentally impossible to reverse-engineer or even just edit the data of a fully functional Imaginators figure.

There were only around 12 known Heartbreaker Buckshots to exist, the number of them being functional is rumored to be two, one of which u/EmberDione and u/The_Somnambulist possessed.

Fast forward to yesterday (8/14/2026), u/Gibby_230 and u/Dague-Pirate-Dad announced both that Pirate Dad had gotten a non-functional Heartbreaker Buckshot, AND that Gibby had dropped the five creation crystal NFCs for the community to play with, with plans to make fully functional replicas. After those posts, u/EmberDione showed up in the comments to say she was willing to dump their functional Heartbreaker Buckshot.

Today (8/15/2026), she joined the Skylanders Reverse Engineering subreddit, and with the help of multiple community members, helped her to copy the data off the figure. As of 4:25 EST on August 15th, 2026, Heartbreaker Buckshot was the last official Skylander ever released to the Skylanders community.

Please give u/EmberDione and u/The_Somnambulist your warm thanks when you see them around.

Heartbreaker Buckshot - In-Game Menu

Questions and Answers

Q: Where do I find the NFC dump?
A: You can find ALL Skylanders NFC dumps at this GitHub link, if you JUST want Heartbreaker Buckshot, you can find it here

Q: What do I need to buy to make an NFC card?
A: This NFC writer, an NFC card, and a functional PC with Windows Mifare Tool or Yet Another Mifare Tool installed, see below question for more details

Q: How do I make an NFC card?
A: This YouTube video is a good guide, as is this one, if you're still struggling

Q: How can I get a custom Heartbreaker Buckshot repainted toy?
A: Reach out to either u/TaylorKreate or FlobeiyToys (u/Crafty-Section6240), they may be willing to make one on commission for you

Q: Isn't it illegal to make NFC cards?
A: Well, the Mod Team is not your legal team. However, as far as I personally understand it, the only real risk comes when you attempt to profit off of a stolen IP, so as long as you do not sell NFC cards to other people, you should be okay. But this is all at your own risk.

Heartbreaker Buckshot - Official Art

Personal note from the mod team

This is a huge day for the Skylanders community. We just want to say how proud we are of everyone involved for finally pulling this off. After almost a decade, we've managed to preserve the rarest figures ever slated for public release, AND in a way the entire community can enjoy them

To celebrate, we've changed the Element of the Week pre-emptively to Magic. The Subreddit banner will also temporarily change to art of Heartbreaker. Both the EOTW and Banner will last about two weeks, before we go back to our typical style.

We hope you all have fun with your new Heartbreaker Buckshots. We know we will.

Happy gaming 💘

~r/Skylanders Mod Team


r/skylanders • • Aug 15 '26

News The 5 Unreleased Creation Crystal Dumps and Heartbreaker Buckshot

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290 Upvotes

Hey everyone! If you haven't heard of me before, I'm Gibby, AKA Gibby_The_Broken Collector. I am the owner of the Skylanders 3D Printing Project and a collector of broken figs that I'm working to repair and bring back into circulation.

Now for the big news. As many of you might have seen from Pirate Dad teasing all day, he has a big announcement. Together with Pirate Dad, I was able to purchase a genuine Heartbreaker Buckshot AND all 5 working unreleased creation crystals. Sadly, Heartbreaker did not have a chip, but the other 5 did. Pirate got me in contact with MoltenLavaCore from the Reverse Engineering Discord, and with his help, we were able to get all 5 dumps! You can find out more about Heartbreaker in Pirate Dad's post here.

When I got back into Skylanders, I didn't want to collect the figures at the start. Instead, I wanted to print all the figures myself. After a lot of searching, I found very little, so I decided to start the Skylanders 3D Printing Project. The goal is to make models of every single character and post them online for free, so that anyone who wants to play the games has options other than simple NFC coins/cards.

Keeping to that goal, all 5 of the missing Creation Crystal Dumps will be added to the Skylanders Ultimate NFC Pack and will soon be available for everyone to use as they wish.

I know most people would prefer to have physical Crystals to add to their collection with these files, which is why I'm not done. I don't have them yet, as I am still waiting on parts/equipment to arrive, but I am actively working on making as realistic replicas as possible so that people who want to complete the full set can. These will include lights, clear plastic, and everything I can do to make them as accurate as possible. I will keep everyone updated on my progress both here, on my Discord, and on my Instagram. I was tempted to delay things until I had everything done, but I didn't want to keep Pirate Dad and everyone else waiting to release the dumps and announce acquiring a Heartbreaker.

You can find all my links here.

For people who want these printed figures but don't have a printer, I do sell them for as cheap as I can reasonably make them. The same will apply to the Crystals.

And no, I am not planning to sell the originals.


r/skylanders • • 2h ago

Question How were you introduced to skylanders?

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109 Upvotes

For me it was skylanders academy and stampycat's playthrough of trap team but how were you introduced to skylanders?


r/skylanders • • 5h ago

Fan Art DragonTober 2026 Day 28: Echo

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69 Upvotes

r/skylanders • • 10h ago

Giants Typo in Skylanders Giants

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76 Upvotes

i’ve been playing this game for 14 years and i’ve never noticed this until today, are there any other typos throughout the series that haven’t been noticed all that much?


r/skylanders • • 7h ago

Discussion I'm seeling my collection, and I am feeling sad, broken...

29 Upvotes

As the title says, I've been collecting skylanders since SSA, I stopped at 2017 and got back at 2020 and didnt stop since then. Now, I am 20, I grew up with these franchise and now I grew up out of it, I am moving far from my home and I can't keep my stuff with me and I need money, and I have a lot of money in this collection, my question is, how can I cope with it? I rember begging my parents to buy me the pack of knight light and crying over it, same with many other packs that I ripped open and enjoied, If I end up selling them I will lose some part of my life. This franchise has been for more than 10 years with me, and I have unlimited memories playing this game, this just feels weird and sad.


r/skylanders • • 26m ago

Fan Art profile pic commission for anon

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• Upvotes

r/skylanders • • 4h ago

Collection Just wanted to share my collection. I started playing when swap forced droppend and never sold my collection

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15 Upvotes

I wanted to play again and looked through my whole collection and thought to take some pictures cause i dont remember I had this many. This doesnt include all my trap crystals and the imagination crystals


r/skylanders • • 18h ago

Fan Art Render: The Hero's of Skylands

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183 Upvotes

r/skylanders • • 7h ago

Collection My cores collection with a very obvious gap

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22 Upvotes

Hopefully I’ll get her for Xmas/birthday


r/skylanders • • 4h ago

Review Every Skylanders Academy Episode Ranked

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12 Upvotes

Today (October 28) marks the 10 year anniversary of Skylanders Academy, and my way of celebraring it is to share with all of you my ranking of all 38 episodes from worst to best. Sadly, I won’t be writing my thoughts on every episode because I find it hard to sum up my thoughts without making it too long or too short. But if there are any episodes you’d like to hear my thoughts on, just tell me. Without further ado…

38: Beard Science (S1 E9)

37: Spyromania (S2 E1)

36: The Hole Truth (S1 E5)

35: Sheep(ball) Dreams (S2 E11)

34: My Way or The Sky Way (S1 E2)

33: Three Sides to Every Story (S3 E8)

32: Crash Landing (S1 E11)

31: Belly of the Beast (S2 E9)

30: One Flu Ocer the Skylander’s Nest (S2 E8)

29: Pop Rocks (S1 E8)

28: Space Invaders (S1 E6)

27: Missing Links (S1 E3)

26: I Dream of Ninjini (S2 E2)

25: Raiders of the Lost Arkus Part 1 (S3 E12)

24: The Truth is in Here (S3 E2)

23: Dream Girls (S1 E4)

22: It Techs Two (S2 E12)

21: Off to the Races (S3 E10)

20: Split (S3 E11)

19: The People vs. Pop Fizz (S2 E7)

18: Who’s Your Daddy? (S2 E10)

17: Return to Cynder (S2 E3)

16: Raiders of the Lost Arkus Part 2 (S3 E13)

15: A Traitor Among Us (S3 E4)

14: The Skylands Are Falling! (S1 E10)

13: Elementary, My Dear Eruptor (S2 E5)

12: Weekend at Eon’s (S3 E6)

11: In Like Flynn (S3 E5)

10: Touch of Evil (S2 E13)

9: Days of Future Crash (S3 E9)

8: Sky Hard (S3 E3)

7: Split Decision (S2 E6)

6: Anger Mismanagement (S1 E7)

5: Skylanders Unite! (S1 E1)

4: Power Struggle (S3 E1)

3: Road Rage (S3 E7)

2: Thankstaking for the Memories (S2 E4)

1: Assault on Skylanders Academy (S1 E12)

Let me tell you a secret, I think this show is actually just meh, yet despite that, I am still so infested in it.
The reason why is because despite not being an exceptional show or anuthing, it still had an impact on me. Aside from being based on one of my favorite properties, in fact, so far being one of the last pieces of media of it, it was also one of the first television series where I felt I made my own opinions on it without any interference from the internet. These episodes have jumped forward and backward in my ranking a ton and it is far differnet today than what it was at the end of 2018 (Belly of the Beast for instance was actually my favorite episode back then). This helped me get a sense of self, if you know what I mean, and it drew me to wanna seek out more shows to watch. So even though it might not be my favorite series of all time, I am still thankful Skylanders Academy exists.


r/skylanders • • 20h ago

Discussion Gonna hate to see these go

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141 Upvotes

Had these since 2012 when they came out. Trying to get my son a Switch 2 before Zelda comes out next week.

I mean I don’t have to sell them but then I wouldn’t be able to get him one before the 5th (would be the 13th).

I know these go for a pretty penny, but I think it’s time to say goodbye to them.


r/skylanders • • 2h ago

Fan Art ✦ HARMONY ✦ Skylanders Anniversary MAP

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6 Upvotes

So because I shared my part in this project I wanted to share that it is finished! I had a lot of fun participanting in it. It was hosted by Not_FishYT on youtube.


r/skylanders • • 4h ago

Video Some regular Trap Team Gameplay...

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8 Upvotes

Some regular Trap Team Gameplay...

Running natively without emulation at 60 fps 1600p on PC.

Coming Soon


r/skylanders • • 23h ago

Other My kaos cosplay

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242 Upvotes

You might have seen this on tiktok but recently took kaos to a con and thought I'd share


r/skylanders • • 20h ago

Other Update on my previous WIP Grave Clobber helmet

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122 Upvotes

My first cosplay ever! first time I’m working with foam, contact cement and well everything I did here. I hope it ended up good, this is pretty much it besides small fixes I’m gonna do!

(Sowing his red chest thingy and making his gauntlets too rn)


r/skylanders • • 8h ago

Discussion My Dream Core Skylanders Roster

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12 Upvotes

This is my dream line up for core skylanders for a hypothetical future skylanders game. To note: giants, trap masters, and swappers were not included. I also have not played imaginators so that’s why there’s nothing from that game.

Let me know your thoughts or what your dream lineup would be. This would be under the assumption that every core here gets a new series figure and wow pow


r/skylanders • • 8h ago

Fan Art Skytober Week 4

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11 Upvotes

r/skylanders • • 5h ago

Discussion Skylanders eon’s elite wave 2?who deserves the air element?

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7 Upvotes

Cards will be released the 15th of november.


r/skylanders • • 22h ago

Discussion Does eon pay the skylanders

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140 Upvotes

So I've been wondering..does eon even pay the Skylanders or are they working for free? Like shouldn't they get paid I mean they probably know they should be getting paid and yeah the skylanders find gold and silver stuff all around the skylands on missions but eon probably uses that gold to pay for food the taxes on the academy the supercharger vehicles and another stuff and yeah there's probably enough to pay the skylanders but what about they're health insurance vacation time and dentist that's if they do get that stuff and yeah I know eon is dead and just an head but still who's handling the finances and paying for the skylanders equipment if they break it or if it so what's your thoughts on it?


r/skylanders • • 2h ago

Challenge I want to do a play though of every game again. would someone mind telling me a Skylander to play

3 Upvotes

I have every Skylander not physically because I don’t have that type of money. Can’t play giants or ssa because they crash my emulators


r/skylanders • • 14h ago

Fan Art Self made Skyland made out of lego!

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25 Upvotes

link to download building instructions for free!:
https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-281672/YellowDonut/skylands/#details


r/skylanders • • 3h ago

Discussion My ideas for a new Game/Gimmick!

3 Upvotes

Hello; this is my first post in this sub after getting back into skylanders this year. I still had all my old figures and decided to expand it; buying up a bunch of figures I never had or always wanted. I'll probably end up posting photos of my collection at some point in the future; I just want to get it to a certain point first.

Giants was my introduction into Skylanders and my favorite character is Stealth Elf as she was the first figure I ever got and played with.

I wanted to post some ideas I had for a new game gimmick as I've been hearing rumors of a possible return. Especially after this years anniversary; (but I feel those rumors may have been floating around for a while.)

Anyway here are my ideas, sorry if these aren't very original or if you heard them before like I said I haven't spent much time here on the sub; but I can assure you these are what I came up with on my own.

Now.

I have a few ideas for a new gimmick if Skylanders were to ever return.

  1. Skylanders: Ascendants, "Rise Beyond Your Limits." Or Skylanders: Unleashed, "Unleash Your True Power."

    The first being the dedicated gimmick group of Skylanders would have ultimate forms that they can enter into under certain in-game conditions (like pokémon mega evolution.) You could have separate skill paths for thier ultimate forms and even introduce ultimate and regular versions of their figures along with chase rares.

  2. Skylanders: Worlds Apart, "Change Your Size. Change Your World."

The Second would be a more in-game gimmick rather than figure based. It would allow every playable skylander to control whether to become giant sized or mini sized. Changing how you maneuver the maps and engage in combat. For figures they could release a regular, mini, and giant version of all Skylanders that release with this generation.

  1. Skylanders: Armored Alliance, "Two Elements. One Hero." Or "Forge Your Destiny."

The third and kinda my favorite idea would be armor. Separate figures from core Skylanders. (like trap crystals) Placing an armor on the portal along with any Skylander would have them wear it in game; giving them Resistance to whatever element the armor is and giving them access to powers of that element; effectively making them 2 elements at once. Armors could have their own upgrade paths and placing a Skylander and armor with matching elements wouldn't give them a defensive boost but would instead make all their attacks 2x as powerful. This system would be the best for bringing your old collection forward to the new generation and not have to worry to much about the power creep/scaling as seen in past games.

Anyone of these would make a great new Skylanders game I feel; but ultimately whatever they may end up doing I'd be happy with regardless.

Thanks for reading.


r/skylanders • • 3h ago

Question Steam Deck Emulation

3 Upvotes

Hi! Incredibly specific question, with little answers online. Is it possible to emulate the games and use a physical portal while on a steam deck? I don't own my games anymore aside from Imaginators nor do I own my Xbox 360, but I do own the portals, and tons of figures. I recently came across my grandma and I's old, partially-shared Skylanders collection and fell down a rabbit hole trying to get back into this series that meant so much to me as a kid. Thanks for any help I can get :)


r/skylanders • • 9h ago

Discussion Trap team villain but their element makes sense

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8 Upvotes

This is my opinion.